Organon aphorism §152

The worse the acute disease is, of so much the more numerous and striking symptoms is it generally composed, but with so much the more certainty may a suitable remedy for it be found, if there be a sufficient number of medicines known, with respect to their positive action, to choose from. Among the lists of symptoms of many medicines it will not be difficult to find one from whose separate disease elements an antitype of curative artificial disease, very like the totality of the symptoms of the natural disease, may be constructed, and such a medicine is the desired remedy.

Organon aphorism §153

In this search for a homeopathic specific remedy, that is to say, in this comparison of the collective symptoms of the natural disease with the list of symptoms of known medicines, in order to find among these an artificial morbific agent corresponding by similarity to the disease to be cured, the MORESTRIKING, SINGULAR, UNCOMMONANDPECULIAR (characteristic) signs and symptoms(109) of the case of disease are chiefly and most solely to be kept in view; for it is MOREPARTICULARLYTHESETHATVERYSIMILARONESINTHELISTOFSYMPTOMSOFTHESELECTEDMEDICINEMUSTCORRESPONDTO, in order to constitute it the most suitable for effecting the cure. The more general and undefined symptoms: loss of appetite, headache, debility, restless sleep, discomfort, and so forth, demand but little attention when of that vague and indefinite character, if they cannot be more accurately described, as symptoms of such a general nature are observed in almost every disease and from almost every drug.

Organon aphorism §154

If the antitype constructed from the list of symptoms of the most suitable medicine contain those peculiar, uncommon, singular and distinguishing (characteristic) symptoms, which are to be met with in the disease to be cured in the greatest number and in the greatest similarity, THIS medicine is the most appropriate homeopathic specific remedy for THIS morbid state; the disease, if it be not one of very long standing, will generally be removed and extinguished by the first dose of it, without any considerable disturbance.

Organon aphorism §155

I say WITHOUTANYCONSIDERABLEDISTURBANCE. For in the employment of this most appropriate homeopathic remedy it is only the symptoms of the medicine that correspond to the symptoms of the disease that are called into play, the former occupying the place of the latter (weaker) in the organism, I. E., in the sensations of the life principle, and thereby annihilating them by over-powering them; but the other symptoms of the homeopathic medicine, which are often very numerous, being in no way applicable to the case of disease in question, are not called into play at all. The patient, growing hourly better, feels almost nothing of them at all, because the excessively minute dose requisite for homeopathic use is much too weak to produce the other symptoms of the medicine that are not homeopathic to the case, in those parts of the body that are free from disease and consequently can allow only the homeopathic symptoms to act on the parts of the organism that are already most irritated and excited by the similar symptoms of the disease, in order that the sick life principle may react only to a similar but stronger medicinal disease, whereby the original malady is extinguished.

Organon aphorism §156

There is, however, almost no homeopathic medicine, be it ever so suitably chosen, that, especially if it should be given in an insufficiently minute dose, will not produce, in very irritable and sensitive patients, at least one trifling, unusual disturbance, some slight new symptom whilst its action lasts; for it is next to impossible that medicine and disease should cover one another symptomatically as exactly as two triangles with equal sides and equal angles. But this (in ordinary circumstances) unimportant difference will be easily done away with by the potential activity (energy) of the living organism, and is not perceptible by patients not excessively deli- cate; the restoration goes forward, notwithstanding, to the goal of perfect recovery, if it be not prevented by the action of heterogeneous medicinal influences upon the patient, by errors of regimen or by excitement of the passions.

Organon notes and explanatory remarks

[109] Dr. von Bonninghausen, by the publication of the characteristic symptoms of homceopathic medicines and his Repertory has rendered a great service to Homeopathy as well as Dr. J. H. G. Jahr in his hand-book of principal symptoms.